Since debuting on FX in 2011, Ryan Murphy’s frightening anthology series, American Horror Story, has served up three highly-watched seasons of tales about ghosts, mental patients and witches. But the upcoming fourth season, premiering in October, will take viewers to a completely new and unexpected place: Jupiter, Florida, home of one of the last remaining freak shows in the 1950s.

Emmy-winner and star Jessica Lange is returning to the series yet again, though it’ll unfortunately be her last season on the show. For her final episodes, she’ll be surrounded by most of the core cast from seasons 2 and 3 in new roles, including Kathy Bates, Angela Bassett, Frances Conroy, Denis O’Hare, Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters and Emma Roberts. A new addition, Michael Chiklis will make his first appearance on the series as Bates’ ex-husband and Peters’ father.

As usual, the first teaser for American Horror Story: Freak Show, titled “Fallen Angel”, doesn’t actually show any of the main actors, but it certainly sets the mood with its creepy music and shocking visuals. And since we still don’t know much about this season in general, we can only guess that the evil puppeteer controlling the fallen angel’s every move is the Clown Killer character that Murphy mentioned would make the new season “quite terrifyingly dark.”

UPDATE: FX, as reported by THR, has confirmed that the above Freak Show teaser is, in fact, a fan-made preview.

For now, what we do know is Lange will reportedly play “a German ex-pat who is managing one of the last freak shows in the U.S.,” and the rest of the cast will star as the freaks in her show, all willing to do whatever it takes to keep their business alive. Paulson recently revealed she’s playing conjoined twins Bette and Dot, yet the other characters joining her in the freak show still remain a mystery.

While Lange will unmistakably be the lead, it seems a lot of the story this season will actually revolve around Bates’ role as the rumored bearded lady and ex-wife of Chiklis’ strongman. Her ex-husband has since remarried to Bassett’s character, thus continuing the character feud the two actresses started last season.

But the bearded lady will also have at least two more enemies on her heels. Wes Bentley will recur as Eddie, a dark tormentor from her past hell-bent on revenge, and don’t forget O’Hare’s character who is on a mission to collect all the freaks for himself.

So tell us Screen Rant readers, from what you know so far, are you excited for the new season of American Horror Story: Freak Show?

American Horror Story: Freak Show is expected to debut in October, but currently no premiere date has been set.

Season 1 – Boring (although I saw Season 2 first and thought I’d watch the first season on the back of that)
Season 2 – Mental but excellent
Season 3 – Pointless and with the most cliched ending ever

I’ll check out SR reviews for season 4 and if it seems decent enough by the time it ends, I *might* check it out online, otherwise, one good season out of three so far isn’t enough goodwill to make me automatically tune in week after week only to find myself disappointed in the writing and acting (in some cases) being shoddy.

I always see your comments and am left wondering if you actually truly enjoy anything? Seems you have something incredibly negative to say every time you post. Not trying to troll you. Just wondering what you DO enjoy?

Thank god Denis O’Hare will be playing a character who (I can only assume) will actually talk. He’s a fantastic character actor, and his role as Larry on the first season was my main reason for watchin, and after a drab season 2 without him I almost stopped watching until I heard he was returning for season 3, only to be somewhat disappointed when he spent most of the season mute. Still, maybe his new role of “collecting all the freaks for himself” will allow him to give a performance closer to his roles in season 1 or even over in HBO’s True Blood. He stole the show in that, and hopefully he’ll steal it again here.